Crime-Mapping Site Reveals Safety Issues

Free Site Overlays Police Reports On Maps, So People Can View Location Of Arrests, Cop Calls

(AP)  The inspiration for CrimeReports.com came a decade ago when Greg Whisenant made the mistake of letting a stranger, who turned out to be a burglar, into his apartment building in Arlington, Va.

At a neighborhood meeting that soon followed, Whisenant was surprised to hear a woman say she had been followed in a parking lot. Whisenant pondered how technology could make a difference.

"Why can't we have some kind of alert system that would tell me something like that?" he wondered.

Now he has created it. A new service on CrimeReports.com, launched last year and expanding nationwide, overlays police reports on maps, so people can view where arrests and other police calls have been made. Users can configure e-mail alerts to notify them of crimes in locations of interest within a day.

The free site relies mainly on police departments paying $100 or $200 a month, depending on their size, to have CrimeReports.com extract the information from their internal systems and publish it online. Public Engines LLC, Whisenant's seven-person company in Salt Lake City, pledges to post no ads on the site.

About 40 law enforcement agencies have signed up, including police in San Jose, Calif., and several Utah jurisdictions. The site also captures and posts information from departments such as the one in Chicago that do not pay Public Engines because they had built their own links into their records.

This coincides with a prominent trend in policing. Since New York City police launched their "CompStat" system in 1994, law enforcement agencies around the country have been capturing and analyzing crime information in more careful detail, in hopes of better planning responses.

But these internal records generally do not come in a uniform, Web-friendly fashion. Even Web sites with crime maps, like the one operated by police in Washington, D.C., don't reveal details on individual reports. Instead such details often are made available in police logs sent to local newspapers.

What's new in CrimeReports.com is its system for extracting the files from disparate police databases.

Then it maps them online in one central location, through an easy Web trick known as a "mashup." Since Google Inc. opened its mapping software to third-party applications, free mashups like this have sprung up to let people plot everything from photograph locations to the sources of campaign donations.

One participant in CrimeReports.com, Sheriff Jim Winder of Salt Lake County, said the $200 monthly fee will be worthwhile mainly because the site provides a new way to increase his agency's public transparency.

"For people to have faith in and continue to be supportive of law enforcement, they need to feel we're divulging all we possibly can," he said. He added that the site's ability to make use of his department's "byzantine" records system was "almost revolutionary."

Officer Melanie Hadley, a spokeswoman for police in Montgomery County, Md., said that before working with CrimeReports.com, her agency could offer no search engine to let people "pinpoint exactly what was going on" in certain areas.

This flood of information could have its downsides.

CrimeReports.com lists only the block on which a crime occurred or was reported, not the actual address, so as to protect victims' privacy. Even so, the Salt Lake sheriff noted that neighbors on a tiny street might be able to figure out, say, which house on their block had a domestic incident that the participants would rather keep quiet.

While that kind of information was always available in department records, "`public' and `readily accessible' are two different things," Winder said.

CrimeReports.com's likely users might be prospective home buyers or neighborhood watch groups seeking insights into criminal activity. Yet it's unclear whether seeing all the police reports from a certain neighborhood will provoke more paranoia than caution.

"It's not our job to censor or to limit or preclude the information we give out," Winder said. But he added: "It is a double-edged sword. More data doesn't always equate knowledge."

Whisenant acknowledges that the site needs to improve its user friendliness. For example, clicking icons for police reports in San Jose brings up such arcane notations as "Final Disposition: A" and "Call Type: 242."

Eventually, Whisenant hopes to integrate more narratives from police reports. CrimeReports.com's partners in Washington, D.C., police already include that for some reports, in classic "Dragnet" tone: "S-1 then struck C-1 in the face with his fist causing C-1 to fall to the ground."

Whisenant believes that with an easier view of such information, people might respond by taking a little bit more care - leaving a porch light on or closing the garage door, for example. What else people do with the data, he suggests, is anyone's guess.

[bleem3]

Sad that crime and health are the two big concerns of U.S. citizens. Crime is ALLOWED to flourish. Such services as this crime-mapping system are like a sideshow. The circus goes on. It''s like doctors trying to perfect the Iron Lung instead of look for the way to prevent polio -- crime needs to be stopped, not condoned as a way to distract citizens while CEOs and elected officials fill their pockets.

[runningralph]

The police in my community make many arrests and get many convictions. The jails are crowded. We had to build a new one about five wears ago. This high crime situation has been brought on by decades of liberal law enforcement procedures. Police should be allowed to profile and question without probable cause. Drug dealers should get death penalty on 2nd offense. Bounty hunters should be allowed to keep drug dealers property. Insane murderers should be destroyed. Taser collars should be used for work release programs. Large state prison inmates should be forced to work 40 hour weeks. County jails should have road cleanup details. Elected officials caught embezelling should be tried for treason. There should be no white collar prisons.

Bleem3: One of the first steps to stopping crime is knowing where they happen. This is an extremely useful tool for law enforcement. Visual feedback is more effective than simple lists of addresses in establishing troubled areas quickly.

[coppertales]

Good idea. When I moved to this area, back in the early 90''s, one of the TV stations ploted the crimes from the previous day. I made note of this on a map and it did not take me too long to realize where I did not want to buy a house. The TV station received so many complaints from local city governments and real estate companies, they ceased this practice.

[dan9111]

crime needs to be stopped, not condoned as a way to distract citizens while CEOs and elected officials fill their pockets.

Posted by Bleem3

And you think the GOVERNMENT will help? They are relying on continued mayhem.

[dan9111]

County jails should have road cleanup details. Elected officials caught embezelling should be tried for treason. There should be no white collar prisons.

Posted by runningralph

Nice. I have no sympathy for you, being pro-violence and all.

[ivandrago]

Google software is going to usher in the first true artificial intelligence.

[runningralph]

Dan9111,
Are you saying you''re pro-violence or that I''m pro-violence? If it''s me, I just want to say I''m not pro-violence, I am anti-crime and pro-democracy. I own property. A human who is truly non-violent, like Jesus, should not aspire to own property. A truly non-violent person could not defend his property nor justify calling cops to defend his property. If you can justify owning property you are pro-violence.

[missingamerica]

I can predict a new trick for kids:

"Hey, lets get some rocks and a couple of hammers and see how many blocks we can light up in red on CrimeReports.com by smashing house and car windows!!!"

[rf35]

runningralph, I like the taser collar idea. It would have come in handy with the mooks who were hired to move my stuff out when I got sent to Japan a few years ago. I also support the ideas of no white collar prisons and 40 hour prisoner work weeks.

[Wookiee-1138]

Not at all a bad idea. I''d pay taxes for that.

[myidoncbs]

runningralph said, "If you can justify owning property you are pro-violence."

That is a stu.pid and utterly incorrect generalization.

Why not try this: own property, but don''t be so attached to it! It''s NOT worth killing/dying for.

In case you did''t know it, here''s a tip for you: EVERYTHING is temporary. All things must pass. Use it, enjoy it, then let it go. It''s going to go someday, whether you want it to or not.

Only truly stu.pid animals get so attached to things that they can''t let go. (Like a dog chewing on a rope. Try to take it away, and he will fight you so hard that you can pick him up in the air and swing the rope around with him holding on by his teeth and he still won''t let go!)

[runningralph]

MyldonCBS,
Are you saying that anyone could walk on to your property and take possession of your house and you would just let go? Or would you call the police? That would be calling someone to do something for you that your are unwilling to do for yourself. And the police are not afraid to be violent. If you are truly non-violent you can''t call the cops. Just walk away and let the invaders have what used to be yours.
I WILL stay on my property- defend it if necessary. And I am comfortable calling the police because I believe in what they do. They apply violence.